Interview with “Pound for Pound” Author Brian D’Souza (Exclusive)

MMAFrenzy recently interviewed author Brian J. D’Souza following our review of Pound for Pound: The Modern Gladiators of Mixed Martial Arts to gain a greater understanding of his outstanding book. Be sure to check out our full review of the book here and check out the book on Amazon.com.

For the readers, what was your goal when you set out to write the book?

Pound for Pound was designed to follow the action and reveal things that audiences couldn’t necessarily see or know about at the original time that they watched major fights. It’s been called “the best behind the scenes MMA books of all time,” and I think that quote aptly sums it up.

I found it interesting to watch the UFC 158 buildup (and the fallout with Diaz) after having read the book, what was that like to watch after having written the book?

GSP’s vulnerability created an aura of excitement; when he lost to Matt Serra, he essentially lost his desire to risk himself in his fights. There were high hopes that Nick Diaz would make GSP angry, and that St-Pierre would swing for the fences or have a war at UFC 158, but this obviously didn’t happen.

As for St-Pierre’s “dark place,” he has revealed on occasion that he endured a difficult childhood. It’s very difficult to speak about such issues in the lead-up to a fight when everyone is probing for weakness, though.

One of the best parts of the book is how you are able to weave these different chapters together into a cohesive story, how difficult was this as a writer?

I enjoyed the challenge of synchronizing five different storylines where there was overlap between the fighters. GSP and BJ Penn were as significant to each other as Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. Chute Boxe teammates Shogun Rua and Anderson Silva both dealt with getting shortchanged by the managers and agents who were intermediaries for PRIDE. I have to give credit to my sources for opening up and filling in the blanks, because they illuminated a lot of dark corners.

Follow on to page two for more on the book including his experience with pivotal figure Miro Mijatovic, things he was unable to tackle with the book, and more.